This invention relates to a playing card dispenser comprising at least two separate compartments from which cards from separate stacks of cards there housed can be dealt.
Among the various games of chance which are played in gaming casinos worldwide is the game identified as "blackjack." In this game a player generally bets money or something of value, and is then dealt from a stack of one or more standard 52-card decks a number of playing cards whose individual point values are as follows: ace--one or eleven points, at the option of the player; king, queen and jack--ten points; and points equalling face value for the remainder of the cards. The cards are usually dealt from a card dispenser, commonly termed a "shoe," by a dealer who is employed by the casino. The game is begun with one or more shuffled full decks of cards making up a stack of cards which is disposed in the card dispenser. Usually, the entire stack of cards is played before the stack is replenished. The object of a player of the game is to be dealt cards which will come close to a total point value of 21, without exceeding 21, than will the point value of the cards dealt by the dealer to himself. If this object is accomplished, the player wins something of value. Conversely, if the object is not accomplished, the player loses his bet.
The type of game above-described is meant to be a game of chance, in that the player is not to know what the probable point value of his cards will be prior to his placing a bet. However, a mathematically astute player, commonly termed a "card counter," can, in fact, keep a statistically significant running total of cards already played from the stack of cards and thereby calculate the probable point value of subsequent cards to be dealt. Utilization of this knowledge removes the "chance" aspect of the game, and can result in an unfair advantage to the player.
As is evident, the apparatus employed in dealing the cards, the card dispenser or "shoe" above-described, is simply a dispenser, and has no accommodation whatsoever for varying in any way the manner in which cards are dispensed to thus reduce the opportunity presented for the "card counter." As is therefore apparent, a need is present for a card dispenser which can be regulateable to maintain the "chance" aspect of the game, yet not require a procedural departure from the normally-accepted manner of playing.